Hamlet and psychiatry intertwined

This article considers selected landmarks in the history of psychiatry and their impact on Hamlet productions, including Burton’s Anatomy of Melancholia, Emil Kraepelin’s manic-depression, Freud’s oedipal complex and R.D. Laing’s ‘divided self’. Additionally, this article considers the way Shakespeare’s Hamlet has influenced the course of psychiatry. The linkages between psychiatry and Hamlet have existed since the 17th century, and perhaps Shakespeare’s Hamlet should have a place on every psychiatrist’s shelf